Suggest to followers

/

124 min.

PlotJ. B. Bernstein (Jon Hamm) is a big time sports agent who, along with his partner Ash Vasudevan (Aasif Mandvi) recently formed their own company. Unfortunately, all of J.B.’s clients have retired, and he is unable to reel in star football player Popo Vanuatu (Rey Maualuga). Desperate to find new clients, J.B. realizes India, with over one billion people, has real potential for untapped baseball talent. He approaches investor Mr. Chang with his proposal - a talent contest staged in India called “Million Dollar Arm.” Contestants score points by demonstrating they can pitch a baseball with speed and accuracy. Along with the prize money, two winners will be flown to the U.S. and receive coaching to become legitimate baseball prospects within two years. Chang commits to providing the funding, on the condition the prospects are ready within only one year. With no alternative, J.B. reluctantly assures Chang the winners will be ready for a major league try-out within one year.

J.B. ap...

Plot

J. B. Bernstein (Jon Hamm) is a big time sports agent who, along with his partner Ash Vasudevan (Aasif Mandvi) recently formed their own company. Unfortunately, all of J.B.’s clients have retired, and he is unable to reel in star football player Popo Vanuatu (Rey Maualuga). Desperate to find new clients, J.B. realizes India, with over one billion people, has real potential for untapped baseball talent. He approaches investor Mr. Chang with his proposal - a talent contest staged in India called “Million Dollar Arm.” Contestants score points by demonstrating they can pitch a baseball with speed and accuracy. Along with the prize money, two winners will be flown to the U.S. and receive coaching to become legitimate baseball prospects within two years. Chang commits to providing the funding, on the condition the prospects are ready within only one year. With no alternative, J.B. reluctantly assures Chang the winners will be ready for a major league try-out within one year.

J.B. approaches veteran baseball pitching coach Tom House (Bill Paxton) who explains cricket, the main sport played in India, and baseball have entirely different motions for bowling and pitching, and getting a fresh recruit ready for a try-out within one year is extremely unlikely, if not impossible. J.B. points how House has nothing to lose and everything to gain by taking up the challenge, and House agrees.

J.B. flies to India and is devastated at the traffic, overcrowding, the lax way the Indians conduct business. He is joined by long time elderly major league scout, Ray Poitevint (Alan Arkin), and hires Amit Rohan (Pitobash Tripathy) as his interpreter. After lengthy try-outs in numerous cities, two youngsters emerge as the winners - Rinku Singh (Suraj Sharma) and Dinesh Patel (Madhur Mittal), and they are flown to the U.S. to begin their baseball training. The pair, who grew up in poverty in India, are quickly overwhelmed by the sights and sounds of America. After they accidentally set off a fire alarm at the hotel J.B. arranged for them, J.B. is forced to let them stay at his home. For their baseball training, J.B. dumps the pair by House and his staff while he runs off to close more deals. In so doing, the pair, who both barely speak English, feel abandoned. J.B.’s tenant Brenda Fenwick (Lake Bell) is the only person who genuinely seems interested in their well-being.

The boys and Amit get drunk at a party and J.B. has to drive them home, losing his second crack at signing Popo (Rey Maualuga). Brenda calms him down and makes him realize he is treating the two boys like a business deal. The next day, J.B. trades in his Porsche for a Dodge Caravan and joins the boys for their prayers. Ignoring J.B.’s pleas of the two boys' lack of readiness, Chang insists his terms be fulfilled and the boys demonstrate their baseball skills one year from the time they arrived in the US. ESPN, Sports Illustrated, as well as local media are joined by numerous major league scouts to watch the boys pitch. The try-out is a complete disaster. The pair are both very nervous and pitch without speed or control, failing to impress anyone.

Brenda convinces J.B. that the boys be given another try-out. Chang refused to go along with it, and no scouts are interested in wasting their time on another fiasco. All hope is lost until Ray arranges for J.B. to meet the Pittsburgh Pirates head scout who was away in Puerto Rico for the first try-out, and agrees to come. This time, J.B. insists the boys relax and have fun. The scouts are quickly impressed as the pair consistently deliver 85 and 90 mph fastballs thrown accurately, and both are offered a contract by the Pittsburgh Pirates.

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article "Million_Dollar_Arm", which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0